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Columbus-area commuters lead the state in the amount of time, and expense, spent crawling in
backed-up traffic.

The typical rush-hour area commuter spent an extra 40 hours, and about $60 on extra fuel, on
the road due to traffic congestion in 2011, according to an annual study by Texas A&M
Transportation Institute.

Those figures gave Columbus commuters the unwanted distinction of spending more time sitting
in traffic than in any of Ohio’s major urban areas. Cincinnatians spent 37 hours sitting in
traffic; Cleveland residents wasted 31 hours.

The 40 unwanted hours in traffic jams placed Columbus-area commuting delays two hours above
the national average and 25th among 101 urban areas in
Texas A&M’s Urban Mobility Report. Columbus ranks as the 36th-largest metro
area in the report as calculated by the researchers.

The study found that a typical 20-minute trip without traffic congestion takes about 23 1/2
minutes during morning and evening rush hours.

The cost of traffic congestion in 2011 (including a value of $16.79 an hour on wasted
motorist time and fuel and $86.81 an hour for truckers) totaled $753 million, or $847 for each of
the area’s 683,000 rush-hour commuters.

The 2010 Census found that 82 percent of Columbus-area residents drive to work with an
average commute time of 22 minutes and 42 seconds.

Traffic congestion nationally is below its pre-recession peak in 2005, but will edge higher
in coming years, the study’s authors concluded.

A mix of better traffic flow, construction projects (such as the I-71 and I-70 rebuilds in
Columbus), improved public transportation and other alternatives, such as telecommuting, are needed
to ease traffic, the study said.